


Drowning Would Be Kinder

by cheerynoir



Series: Drowning!verse [1]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, M/M, POV Second Person, Pining, Ramsay is his own warning, Robb is oblivious, Suicidal Thoughts, Theon makes terrible life choices, and Asha is the only one with a drop of common sense
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-16
Updated: 2015-03-16
Packaged: 2018-03-18 05:18:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 651
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3557480
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cheerynoir/pseuds/cheerynoir
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Theon's seventeen when he realizes he's absolutely fucked, twenty when he figures out he's pining for his best friend, and twenty-two when he figures he should at least attempt to get over it, one way or another.</p>
<p>(But <em>shhh</em> it's a secret.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Drowning Would Be Kinder

You’re seventeen and you adore him. You realize this slowly, without panic. It is in the way you centre yourself around him, it is the way you fall into step. It is in the way you orbit each-other, and it is the way that you spend far too long staring at his mouth when he talks. It is in the way you duck your head and shrug and go along with whatever he wants, regardless of how stupid an idea. It’s in the way he does the same for you, griping even as he helps you sneak out.

( _"Sure, Robb. Whatever you want."_ )

You don’t breathe a word of your discovery, terrified that it will stop. He looks at you like you’re worth something, and you don’t know why but you’ll be dead and given back to the sea before you willingly put that in danger. So he laughs and touches your arm, your back, the nape of your neck, and you bite back a smile and smoke a cigarette instead of leaning into him like you want to.

You want a lot of things, you realize this too. You want to feel his stubble burn across your mouth and you want his hips under your callused palms. You want his eyes on you, only you, and you want the generous curl of his smile. You’re a greedy thing. Selfish. If he notices, he doesn’t say.

He’s eighteen and you’re twenty when he falls into your bed, drunk and laughing, splayed out like an offering. It isn’t the first time this happens and it isn’t the last, but something about the way the street-light cuts through the blinds to slice across the flat plane of his stomach where his shirt has ridden up imprints this time in your memory like a brand. You try to swallow. Your mouth is dry and tastes of salt and tequila. He pulls you down by your shirt and you don’t sleep at all that night. His hand is hot in yours.

You sister takes one look at you the next morning, squints at you through the haze of your third cigarette in half an hour, and scoffs so loud you think she’ll wake him. You can still feel his breath against your neck and the heat of him burning along your side. “Just fuck him and get it out of your system,” she says, and hands you a cup of coffee like a consolation price.

You drink it black, and do not mind the bitterness. 

He drinks too much coffee when he wakes up, grumbling about hangovers and over-indulgences, and says nothing about the sweetness he mumbled against your collar before dawn. He eats bacon and eggs and toast dripping butter and jam with hands that do not twitch and itch and want the way yours do. He goes back to his dearest Jeyne and you drink more coffee and smoke too many cigarettes to rinse the taste of _I-love-you-I-love-you-I-love-you_ from your teeth. Then you go to work and pretend it didn’t happen. You’ve gotten good at that, over the years.

You’re twenty-two and you want to drown in his pretty blue eyes. You think it might be a fitting way to go.

You’re twenty-two and you stand on a bridge, looking down at the black, cold water below. It’s late November. You can see your breath. You’re twenty-two, and you think that drowning might be peaceful. You’re twenty-two and you’re not thinking of anything except how long it’s been since you swam in the sea. You’re twenty-two and cold right down to your bones, tired like you just got off a double-shift after three hours of sleep, and you still can’t pry yourself away from the railing.

“Are you planning on jumping any time tonight?”

You’re twenty-two and you meet Ramsay Snow. 

Looking back, you should have just jumped and saved everyone the trouble.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks so much for reading - let me know what you think. And thank-you to my wonderful beta theonaf. 
> 
> Come say hi on tumblr!


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